A review by hberg95
The Communist Manifesto and Other Writings by Karl Marx, Friedrich Engels

5.0

Every time I read Marx & Engels, whether it’s Capital or The Communist Manifesto or The German Ideology, I’m struck by how well their descriptive work mirrors conditions that exist today. They were so adept at describing economic and social issues that it’s easy to read and also still holds up when describing the situation in the United States or elsewhere today. 

I was reminded during this read through that Marx & Engels emphasize globalism as a factor of capitalism that must be reckoned with in some way. Like Bong Joon-Ho said, “We all live in a country called capitalism”. What this means, according to Marx & Engels themselves, is that we cannot hope to merely effect revolutionary change on a local scale, at some level, we need global buy-in. I also particularly enjoyed the discussion of property rules under Communism, the varying kinds of (mostly ineffective) socialisms, and the discussion of communism as a strategy for ending all forms of domination (it reminded me a lot of bell hooks’ feminism).

Beyond the central text, I also liked the response to the Hegelian Philosophy of Right and the way it described religion as a system of ideas that adds flowers to chains, essentially convincing people that their lot in life is deserved and whatnot. This description of toxic religiosity made me think a lot about Nietzsche’s critiques of religion which were, no doubt, influenced in some way by Marx & Engels. I also liked the discussion of ‘partial revolution’ and the way it can harm meaningful efforts to real revolution (or how it can be meaningful in itself).